


Oculatus Abis

by glee



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-12-28
Updated: 2011-12-28
Packaged: 2017-10-28 08:21:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 845
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/305823
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glee/pseuds/glee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Why Krycek never died... An existential piece, taking place between 'Existence' and 'The Truth'</p><p>This story references Existence\S.R.819\Apocrypha\One Son\<br/>Patient X\Deadalive\Requiem\FtF\Pilot\William\Trust No1\Terma\Amor Fati\Biogenesis - all the classics!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Oculatus Abis

_  
**I**   
_

_Twirling travel of a bullet through the air, cutting right between the eyes_

 _  
_

Marita:

You are alone, walking home on a late night. The taxi cabs that are always there are waiting by the plaza squares, the modern age sidewalks paved around bank headquarters and pharmaceuticals. Among them the embassy stands tall, made of marble chintz in wide pads all perfect and rectangular, its lobby windows filled with a perpetual trickling.

Walking away from these windows with hands hidden, you wear a flapping pale trench coat and scarf. You enjoy the warm taxi ride home, and at home you debrief yourself for tomorrow’s meeting with an open suitcase by lamplight, wearing glasses as you sip something hot, pensively scanning the details of an Arab national.

Krycek knocks. You see him through the peephole looking to his right as if something’s there.

The first thing you can say:

‘Shouldn’t you be dead Alex?’

Krycek stays still before the door frame.

‘You heard about that.’   
‘I heard about you at the FBI… Agent Scully made it too.’

He nods.

‘That wasn’t your plan, was it?’

Krycek pretends something’s to his left and looks away, so you shut the door with force.

The man knocks again, keeps on doing so, with your eye open wide at the door, mouth agape: somehow it’s his fake plastic arm that knocks.

 

  


  
_  
**II**   
_   


_The onslaught of black from one’s eyes, circling down alien shapes_

 _  
_

Krycek stood in the middle of the room, Marita's hand trailing up and down the now flesh & blood limb. He stares at the side of her face as it blinks in awe.

‘What did you do Alex?’   
‘Didn’t you hear?’

She finally looks him in the eyes.

‘How was it done?’   
‘Didn’t need to die for it.’

How much did she know?

‘Is this…how…?’

 _SR 819. Skinner at the trigger.  
_   
‘So you’re back.’ She turns away, looks at something that isn’t there on the ground, turning her back. ‘And now?

Krycek pulls her towards him.

‘They’ve won again Marita. I can see that now. The new project. Nothing we can do. And Mulder’s gone…’   
‘I don’t know where he is Alex. You can let go.’   
‘Another dead guy walks the Earth. He’s gonna learn too.’   
‘What is it that you want here Alex?’

He stares.

‘You know for years me and you, we’ve been caught up in this, playing the game ‘cos something new was always in the shadows. And then when it all ends and the lights come on you see what you’re holding. What you’ve become.’   
‘We’re just alone. I get it. We lost.’

He forces his face forwards, but her hand on a cheek keeps it gently at bay. Both stare as she caresses the back of his head, his breath growing sharper on her eyes and nose. Her teeth grit, eyes well. She reaches the nape of his neck, the cervical bump, feels the knobbly ridge. Her hand trembles over them again just to make sure –

There's horror now in her eyes.

‘Alex…’

He nods.

‘You’re one.’

His eyes well.

‘But I’m now nothing. You’re just holding the dead, not the enemy...’

Then he kisses her, lingers, pulls back.

‘I'm nothing.' He can’t look her in the face.   
‘Did you…how did you Alex?’

SR 819? No.

‘Sold the one thing left.’

She holds her hand to his scalp.

‘Should’ve been endgame shouldn’t it?’ A desperate smile. ‘But I couldn’t die Marita. I couldn’t let it go.’   
‘I told you to.’   
‘But I was perfect for it, like Mulder.'

 _The horror of the gulag. The death of Kritschgau_

‘You’re perfect for it too.'   
‘I let it go Alex.’   
‘And now?’ He exhales, exasperated, looking around the room and seeing nothing but objects and alcoves. ‘Where do we go? It’s over. It’s all over now. Nothing left.’

 _Cancer man down the stairs  
_   
‘So die for nothing or stay with me and give the past its purpose. Something to save.’

 _The faceless boy oozing outside the glass_

‘We can’t fight it.’

 _The rip roar of the monster out of bee stings and black oil_

‘But we’ll never die. Don't you get it?’

Marita gives him back his shirt, refusing to give an answer just yet.

  


  
_  
**III**   
_   


  


_You've never seen one before, have you? Something you thought only children and fools believed in… (The travel of a bullet)_

 

Alex:

You are alone, in the shadows by a rock quarry. The chain link fence is unlocked, unguarded; you walk through.

You’ve heard the details of Spender and Scully & Mulder’s baby, the second worst thing you’ve heard after Marita’s decision.

 _Nothing left  
_   
And Mulder’s gone.

Jumping in the pit you land on your knees, and as the surge overtakes your body, you see yourself and Marita holding hands, with her on her knees too, both of you beneath an eye, a whirlpool of forces, bound together in a cyclone of leaves, a blinding light –

Obliteration.

 

  


  
_  
**IV**   
_   


  


  
Marita sees for a moment an image of him at home, a ghost that was always there, standing in the alcove.


End file.
